


The Trials and Tribulations of Bella Baggins (Heaped Upon Her by her New Family)

by GeistAdamant



Series: The Naddan 'Verse [3]
Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Dwarrow Politics, Erebor, F/M, Hobbit Stink Eye, M/M, The Lonely Mountain, This shit's gonna get messy, Uncomfortable Conversations, Xenophobia, adjusting to a new home, lots of written food descriptions, tags will be updated as I update the work
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-11
Updated: 2020-03-14
Packaged: 2020-12-07 22:42:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 18,981
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20983589
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GeistAdamant/pseuds/GeistAdamant
Summary: Bella and her daughters finally arrive in Erebor.  Naturally, not everyone is pleased at this turn of events and Bella must deal with this as best she knows how while also protecting her daughters and helping them adjust to their new environment.  But Bella Baggins has never been a shrinking violet of any sort and has exactly zero plans to start being one now (although, there may or may not be plans that involve her battle-tested skillet).





	1. Erebor

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Exeunt: Dale. Entre: Erebor.

Bella fell back on her bed in the Queen's Chambers, the air leaving her lungs in an exhausted rush. It had been a very, _very_ long day and this bed – big enough to fit all of Gaffer Gamgee's growing brood with ease – was rather a comfort to her sore back. Bless the dwarf who had put the warming pans underneath it earlier. Bella stretched a bit, feeling naught but relief as her back and shoulders twisted and popped. Carrying her daughters was not getting any easier the older they became.

The first view of Erebor, though, as the morning mist had started to burn off... Now that had been _something_. Bella hadn't seen Erebor in over five years and to see the change in it, compared with the memory of her last view – the juxtaposition of the two images was rather intense.

“Mama, you said that Erebor was all broken up rocks. Like Farmer Maggot's wall on his farm when that tree came down on it last year,” Eglantine had called out to her mother from her seat in front of her father on his pony.

“I promise that I told no falsehood,” Bella said in response.

“Ah, you'd be surprised with what desperation and cold weather can do for one's work ethic,” Bofur chimed in. “We got them doors rebuilt before the winter was over.”

“You rebuilt the doors in a _winter?_” Bella somewhat rhetorically asked, thunderstruck.

“Yup. We moved the badly injured, ill, infirm, elderly and young inside the mountain pretty soon after you were gone. Anyone who so much as fit the qualification of 'able to hold a hammer' was thrown at this thing,” Bofur casually explained as he waved a hand at the tall, magnificent edifice that were Erebor's doors rebuilt.

Thora, who was sitting in front of Fili on his pony and riding abreast of Bella's own shaggy little mount (name of Emerald, apparently) looked up at the mountain, her little mouth a perfect 'o' of awe.

“Those are big doors. Really, really big doors,”

spoke Bella in awe.

“What an astute observation you have made there auntie,” Kili said with a cheeky grin, nearly falling off his pony with a squawk of mixed indignation and terror when Dwalin moves past him and cuffs him upside the head.

“I see what you're doing!” Kili yelled after a chuckling Dwalin.

“And you're being a twit,” Fili cheerfully says to his brother as he helps him right himself in his saddle.

“I think I may vomit,” Bella muttered as they walked the ponies under a sturdy overhang and the party began dismounting.

“There's nothing to worry about,” Thorin reassured Bella as the whispers began and then spread like wild fire of the return of the king after almost a year's absence.

“'Nothing to worry about?'” Bella parroted back at Thorin as he handed the reins of his pony off to a stable hand and came to help Bella down to the ground. “Thorin, people are _staring and whispering._”

“Well, it is only natural,” Thorin said as he offered his arm to Bella. “Many of these dwarrow have never seen a hobbit before. And didn't a great many hobbits stare and whisper when we were in the Shire?”

“Point taken,” Bella grudgingly agreed as they joined the others. She was pleased to see that Thora and Eglantine were being held by Fili and Kili; the gathering crowd – despite Thorin's point – was alarming her a little.

“Tell me that dwarrow do not gossip like fishmonger's wives,” Dori said, eyeing the crowd a bit critically as they caught up to their group and began moving toward the giant doors, “and I shall call you a liar.” 

“Nori's already gone and disappeared,” Ori offered up as Dwalin peeled off to go speak to a dwarrow holding a long boar spear and sporting an _incredibly_ bushy ginger beard and mustache.

The whispering followed them all the way to the Royal Wing, sounding almost like a breeze on a springtime day. And Bella was no fool, so of course she noticed the several sets of eyes that were watching her and her children with a less than friendly or curious bend. While Thorin did indeed have a point that many of the dwarrow now living in the mountain had likely never set eyes on a hobbit before, many were undoubtedly unhappy (at best) about a foreigner being brought into their household, so to speak, much less the royal line.

_Well, it's tough nuts to that lot._ Bella thought as the guards fell in step all around them.

“Where is Dis?” Thorin inquired of a guard as they passed through a rather marvelous arch bedecked in jewels and gold and silver, an arch that apparently marked the boundary area for the royal's area of the mountain.

“The Lady Dis is currently in council; I dispatched a guard to inform her of your arrival,” The bushy ginger dwarf Bella had seen Dwalin speaking with earlier told Thorin.

“Which means imminent death for you,” Dwalin chuckled.

“Oh, brother, please,” Balin chastised the younger son of Fundin, smacking him over the head with the thin leather-bound volume in his hand. “Act your age, would you?”

“Never!” Dwalin declared with glee as they passed through doors of superb craftsmanship; the glimpse Bella got of them as two brawny dwarrow guards opened them for the approaching party was evidence enough.

“Fee,” Thora said in possibly the loudest stage whisper in the history of Arda – the lack of guile and open honesty in children were two things Bella loved. “Why's Uncle Dwalin 'pecting Papa to go squish?”

“You'll understand in a bit, sweetheart,” Fili promised her.

“Oh, my,” Was all Bella could get out of her mouth when they entered the Royal Wing proper. Sumptuous fabrics, luxuriously thick rugs, and glittering wall carvings and decoration as far as the eye can see.

“And this is just the antechamber,” Kili said with a giggle at Bella's agog expression. “That hall leads to my mum's chambers and mine and Fili's. That one there leads to a small sorta guest wing for the realllllly important guests and that hall leads to the King and Queen's chambers. A bright spark of an ancestor of mine a loooooong, long time ago figured out the key to a happy marriage was apparently separate bedrooms. Either that or he kept getting kicked out of his bedroom.”

“Why would a king be kicked out of his own bedroom?” A curious Eglantine had inquired.

“Er... you'll figure it out when you're older, I promise,” Kili hastily said under a threat of stink eye from his uncle.

There were several rather ridiculous sounding giggles coming from behind Bella, she could only roll her eyes and keep walking.

_We are definitely not in the Shire anymore,_ was the first thought to pierce the blankness wrought by the utter, ridiculous opulence that were the king and queen's chambers.

“I know what you're thinking: These are the prettiest rooms you've ever seen in your life, auntie,” Kili started in the usual style employed by him and his brother amongst friends – nothing short of grandiose and over the top.

“That's one way to put it,” Bella distractedly agreed. “These rooms are certainly very... fine.”

“I'm sure it will take you some time to get used to your surroundings, Bella, but there's a certain something through here that I think might help you in your adjustment,” Thorin offered up.

“Then, by all means, lead the way, please,” Bella replied, privately wondering what there could be inside of what was surely the largest mountain in the world that could possibly help a creature used to greenery and open spaces (ie Bella herself) adjust to her new home.

Thorin lead the way down the hall and through doors that were even more opulent than those leading to the Royal Wing (a feat Bella had not even thought possible, yet here they were) – marvels of beaten and hammered gold and ebony decorated in gems, filigree and carvings that had surely been a by-gone craftsman's masterpiece.

“We'll give you a tour of your new quarter's in a moment; I think that you will want to see this first,” Thorin promised, moving toward some doors that Bella hadn't noticed when they had first entered the Queen's chambers – her chambers.

Dwalin moved forward, tossing to Thorin a key that he must have received when they had arrived, possibly from massive ginger bearded dwarf.

“I would close your eyes, Bella,” Balin said, appearing at Bella's elbow, a large smile on his face.

Bella rolled her eyes, partly in amusement, partly at just being able to feel the almost child-like glee that was permeating the air. But she did close her eyes and allow herself to be lead forward. It was fairly easy (not to mention quick) to ascertain that it was Fili and Kili who had each taken Bella by an arm and lead her across the room. Especially with a “Watch your step,” or a “I'd lift up your foot, save your toes a damn painful stubbing... now, auntie,” there along with plenty of colorful commentary and hints that were deliberately obtuse.

“I feel a breeze. Are we outside of the mountain?”

“Just a moment's patience more, and you'll be rewarded, I promise, auntie,” Fili swore. “Alright, we're going to be lifting you up now.”

Careful hands were then moved to Bella's elbows and she felt the air around her shift and then – 

“I feel grass under my feet. Why do I feel grass under my feet?”

“Alright, Bella, you can open your eyes now,” Thorin said from somewhere close by.

Bella slowly opened her eyes, blinking against the sunlight and theoretically felt her mouth drop open and theoretically felt her feet take her a few steps forward.

“H-How in the – It's grass! On the– the bleeding mountainside!”

Bella stepped a few more feet forward into the large but bare garden that held so much promise just by the sheer amount of _space._

“There are going to be craftsmen coming to install glass doors and panels – so you and the girls can come out here no matter the weather or time of year,” Thorin started to explain.

“This might be the best idea you've had in years,” Oin declared, picking up a pinch of dirt from a near by planter and crumbling it between his fingers. “Sunlight provides something vital to those who dwell above ground. Hobbits, men, even the elves.”

“What would happen if they don't get sunlight?” Fili asked, looking suddenly apprehensive.

“It's rather a list: Rickets, joint pain ranging from mild to severe, hair loss, any wounds received would heal far slower, they get sick or get infections far more often, fatigue, their bones could become brittle and fragile...”

And, as Oin is reading off this list in the most casual tone – almost as if he were discussing the weather, Bella feels herself growing a tad green around the gills, as it were, and every dwarrow present is looking increasingly horrified.

“Uncle Thorin's best idea yet!” Kili loudly interrupts their resident, mostly deaf healer. Who, for his part, shoots Kili a sharp look of annoyance, because he clearly had no idea how much he was freaking everyone out.

“Thank you, Kili.”

“I don't want my bones to break,” Eglantine said, her tone a little wobbly.

“I don't want my hair to fall out,” Thora chimes in, her lower lip beginning to tremble a touch.

“Darlings, unless you take after your cousins here – which, please don't make me grey before my time – getting rickets isn't something you'll need to worry about,” Bella was quick to reassure her children. Turning, she next addressed herself to Thorin. “Thorin, this is wonderful and... surprisingly thoughtful, thank you. I'll be able to spend the winter planning out this garden. I just hope that it wasn't too much trouble.”

“It wasn't. This used to be my grandmother's garden; she liked to fancy she had a green thumb -”

“The only thing Queen Dris could successfully grow were the bits and bobs used by Nori's predecessor,” Dwalin darkly chuckled. “She killed everything else.”

“Yes, thank you, Dwalin,” Thorin said somewhat testily – but he didn't contradict his oldest friend. “As I was saying. This used to be my grandmother's garden, but it was smaller in her day. I ordered it to be enlarged and more grass added and areas for... cultivation or whatever it is you do since we can be reasonably sure that you can actually grow things here that aren't of a poisonous nature.”

“And now, shall we show you where you'll be laying your head after a long day's pottering around the garden?” Balin cheerily suggested.

And before anyone can so much as utter a syllable, before Bella can even try to form something approximating a sentence after the sheer surprise that was this gift from Thorin – 

“WHERE ARE THOSE IDIOT SONS OF MINE??”

“Aaaaaand there's Dis,” Thorin deadpanned as the blood drained from Fili and Kili's faces.

“We're dead.”

“We're doomed.”

Fili and Kili dive around Bofur and Nori and Bifur, tucking and rolling to bound to their feet as a whirl of skirts and braids comes storming out into the garden.

“YOU TWO,” You'd have to be as thick as a Bracegirdle (and Bella was not, no matter what anyone said) to not be able to deduce that the current loud disturbance of the day came in the form of the Lady Dis.

“Mum, look!” Kili said, holding a baffled Eglantine up and out from his body like she was a shield. Or sacrificial lamb to his mother's anger. Neither option pleased Bella greatly, it needed to be said. Especially when Fili held up her other child in the exact same fashion.

“Amê dashtân, put the children down,” Dis ground out through her teeth. “They will not save you from the thrashing that's been eight months in the offing for the single worst explanatory note that's ever had the misfortune to be written into existence.”

“Oi, what did you put in that note to mum – It wasn't what I told you, was it?” Fili demanded, rounding on his younger brother.

“I don't even remember what I wrote!” Kili protested, neither son of Durin putting their cousins down, still apparently believing or foolishly holding onto the hope that they would be sufficient protection from their mother. Despite very recent verbal communication to the contrary.

Bella exchanged a look with Thorin and he rolled his eyes, but stepped forward to pluck first Thora from Fili's arms (passing her off to Bella) and then taking Eglantine from Kili before perching her on his hip as he stepped well out of the firing line.

And, oh, boy, does Dis fire. No one says anything, or dares to move while Dis reads both her boys the riot act. In multiple languages and with multiple hand gestures that Bella is imminently grateful that the girls cannot understand. Both boys try to get a word in edgewise but Dis is just not having it, so they both end up shuffling their feet and looking at the floor for prolonged periods until Dis feels she has said her piece and then pulls both Fili and Kili in a strangling hug.

“It's good to see that some things never change,” Bofur cheerfully says into the ensuing silence.

“Oh, please,” Dis snorts with a dismissive wave of her hand. “And just who might these sweet little creatures be?”

Both girls shrink back a little at this sudden change in demeanor and attitude, clinging a little tighter to their respective parents. Eglantine untangles her hand from where it had been clutching to the collar of Thorin's greatcoat and pokes him in the nose to get his attention.

“Why's that lady have a longer beard than you?” And, dear Yavanna, it's like the nose incident all over again.

“Because I chose to keep my beard shorter, sweetheart. You'll understand one day, I promise.”

All things considered, it wasn't the worst explanation he had given for something, Bella reflects internally. And it was age-appropriate, too.

“Oh, she is darling,” Dis coos, her eyes going soft at the corners.

“Mum, allow us to do the honors,” Fili says grandly, bounding up to his mother and flinging an arm around her shoulders.

“Yes, let's,” Kili echoed his brother both in tone and mannerism, moving to his mother's other side.

“Our cousin's, Eglantine and Thora; they're twins and Eglantine is the eldest,” Fili explained, motioning to each of the girls in turn.

“Twins?” Dis echoed, her brow furrowing slightly. “I don't think the Line of Durin has ever had twins before.”

“Perhaps not, but my family lines house their fair share of multiple births,” Bella offered up in explanation.

“And this their mum, Bella – she makes amazing food. You've got to try  
her apple and quince pie,” Kili raved. “Jinivere loves her.”

“So, you would be the woman who's cooking my boys have been about for the last several years. The hobbit.”

And the way Dis says, “the hobbit,” is just so utterly reminiscent of how Thorin had said it in her front hall in Bag End. It felt like a lifetime ago, but it was so strikingly similar that Bella can't help the snort of laughter that escapes her – and neither can several others present.

“Did I say something amusing?”

“Yes, mum, just go with yes,” Fili chuckled with eyes a-twinkle with amusement.

“But, yes, I am she. I'm Belladonna Baggins, and it's a pleasure to finally meet the woman Fili and Kili raved about.”

The day does not slowed down from there. After being shown around hers and the girls (incredibly) opulent bedrooms, which both girls loved just for the size of their room because “all the toys we could fit in here!”, they had gone and tracked down Bombur, who was in the kitchens being visited by his wife, Tonil, who had brought along their nearly 7 month old little girl, Tonilia. And hadn't Bifur and Bofur both gone into exultations of delight at meeting their little niece and wasn't it such good luck, an incredibly good omen for them all that every baby born to members of the Company thus far had all been girls?

Little Tonilia, with her happy, gummy little grin and her very ginger peach fuzz, so entranced Bofur and Bifur they didn't even notice when everyone else bid farewell to Tonil and Bombur and quit the kitchens.

After the kitchens it was the forges and the workshops. Neither Thora or Eglantine was allowed near any active flame or anything that might have just been inside said flame. Which earned Thorin a few brownie points, it must be said.

And then came the market closest to their new home, a hustling, bustling hive of people, voices, sights and smells. And then it was the guild halls, the upper and lower training fields, the mine entrances, the library (which they nearly lost Bella and Ori to), the mushroom caves and on and on and on.

It's a whirlwind and Bella honestly cannot recall half the things said to her today. But at least she'll have the time to sort everything out and get acquainted with these new surroundings of theirs. At least, this is what Bella tells herself as they eat dinner in the dining room attached to the kitchen she hadn't known existed in the royal wing earlier. And didn't that present possibilities?

Both Thora and Eglantine, who had been very curious and asked lots and lots of questions every chance they had on the whirlwind tour today, were almost nodding off into their dessert and so the decision had been made to call it an early night. And once the girls are washed, dressed in some clean night clothes, and tucked into bed with their favored animals, Bella bids Thorin good night and just flops back first onto her bed. Once she manages to climb up onto it, at least.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Amê -- Mine  
dashtân -- A plural form of son  
So, essentially, Dis is saying "Sons of mine,"


	2. Cyclical Conversation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The second day dawns...

The morning after their arrival (and rather breakneck speed tour of Erebor), Bella rose slowly from the warm depths of slumber. It took a moment before she became aware of her surroundings but once she was a little more awake, she drew in a great breath and started stretching in bed. That was when the screaming hit her ears. Those screams -- her daughters' gleeful ones and older screams that sounded far more panicked -- had her sitting upright in bed, immediately. Then the scent of burning bread and burning meat assailed Bella's nostrils most offensively as she grabbed her housecoat from where she had tossed it the night before, pulling it on as she sped her way to the malodorous scents and screams.

"What in Arda's name is going on here?"

"We were trying to make breakfast for you and amad, auntie," Fili offers when no one else appears to be willing to answer.

"And what -- oh, that really is a very unpleasant smell -- were you trying to make?"

"Just toast and eggs and bacon," Kili answers. "Eggs and Thora had the idea of serving it to you both in bed."

"And then the bacon decided to 'splode," Eglantine added.

"That'd be the screaming. Yes, yes I think I see now," Bella nodded. "Just... Just let me go get dressed and I'll help you kitchen miscreants make breakfast." Bella shuffles back toward her bedroom nearly crashing into a zombie-like Dis in the doorway.

It doesn't take but a few minutes to throw on a shift and a dress and run a comb through her curls. Upon Bella's return to the kitchen, both Thora and Eglantine are munching on dried fruit slices that had appeared from somewhere and Dis was supervising the clean up of the kitchen.

"I've been meaning to ask," Bella said, "Why is there a kitchen in our quarters? I mean, don't think I'm complaining because I most certainly am not. It just seems... a bit out of place for... our surroundings."

"I would have to double check with Balin because he remembers the family history better than I, but I believe a few centuries back there was a spate of assassination attempts -- including poisonings -- and decided it was prudent to put a kitchen in the Royal Wing."

“Well, that's... awful.”

Dis shrugged. “That's dwarrow for you.”

“Yes, yes, the family history lesson is nice and all that, but mum, let Bella cook breakfast!” Fili implores his mother, even employing some rather flappy looking shushing sort of motions with his hands that has Kili rolling his eyes at his elder brother.

“You and your bloody breakfast,” Kili good-naturedly grumps.

“Oi, I needed all the breakfast I could get my hands on with the world's most pain in the arse younger brother that has ever graced Arda,” Fili sassed right back.

This – because this is Kili and Fili we speak of – whole thing threatens to devolve into some sort of good-natured wrestling match right there in the kitchen. Although, neither son of the Durin line were remotely prepared for their mother and aunt grabbing for the closest ear and giving them sharp tugs of warning.

“You two were not raised to bicker this early in the bloody morning. I am not awake enough to have the patience, so, please, do behave.” Dis almost growls.

“We'll behave, amad, promise,” Kili promises, massaging the ear his mother had only just relinquished custody of.

“And I will have absolutely no nonsense at all in my kitchens, or I will revoke dessert rights until I see fit.”

“We shall endeavor to behave and keep our access to treats!”

Bella looks at Dis, who's still semi-glowering at both her high-energy children. “Not a morning person, I take it, Lady Dis?”

“Not in the slightest,” Dis yawned, moving to sit on a chair next to Thora, taking the piece of fruit that was offered to her after she sat.

“So... Is not being a morning person a trait of the Durin line?”

“I wouldn't be surprised. These two rockheads most certainly get their obscenely chipper attitudes even though the hour be ridiculously early from their father.”

Bella gave a little nod. “I'll make some coffee with breakfast. Have you ever had coffee?”

“No, I don't think I have. Tea, certainly. Is coffee anything like tea?”

“Yes and no. You'll see when we have breakfast. Boys, show me to the larder.”

Kili and Fili are drafted as cook's assistants to their aunt and in no time at all a hearty breakfast of eggs, bacon, toast, sausages, tomatoes and fried potatoes is laid out on the table.

“Oh, Thorin is going to be sore he missed this,” Dis says as she surveys the repast with appreciation.

“He's not still abed?”

Dis shook her head. “Balin came to get him this morning, he'll be holding open court and then perhaps meet with the council. I'm sure we'll see him at lunch, though.”

Though Bella thought she had cooked enough for a small army, Fili, Kili, Dis and her daughters do much damage to the food prepared (and Dis found out she liked coffee, if she could put sugar and a little milk in it). After the breakfast things are washed and set aside to dry (a task put to Kili and Fili, much to their chagrin and their mother's delight at how Bella handled them), the girls are dressed properly and Dis keeps an eye on them in Bella's sitting room (a notion still so very strange to her that she had a sitting room) while Bella putters around unpacking her things and the girls things until the workers Thorin mentioned the previous day arrive to take measurements for the glass panes for her garden.

“That means I can grow just about anything once I get this garden going,” Bella had mused as she had watched dwarrow after dwarrow trudge through carrying tool boxes and sharp implements and metal and glass and small portable forges to heat whatever they needed to on-site.

“Could you really?” Dis asked.

“Yes. I would hate to sound self-aggrandizing, but a hobbit can grow almost anything.”

“There's been no shortage of self-aggrandizement in this family for a while now and I can tell you that was not it,” Dis said with a snort. “Come; while the workmen do their jobs we'll have lunch in the great hall and afterwards I'll take you to the library,”

“That's very kind of you, Lady Dis, but you don't have to be our personal guide around the mountain,” Bella tried to protest.

“Firstly: Call me Dis. My brother may have cocked things up _incredibly_ badly, but you are, for all intents and purposes, my sister-in-law. Second: I have seen a few hobbits – from my decades of living in the Blue Mountains. The closest your people get to being underground is their homes; those are in no way reminiscent of a mountain. I don't know if this is your polite hobbit nature, but you will need a guide until you can get your bearings and learn your way around. Plus, I get to know my nieces a little better and leave my brother to deal with the crap he left me to deal with for almost eight months. A more than fair trade, I think,” Bella didn't know whether to be worried for Thorin or not at the very sharp grin that flitted across Dis' face.

“Is dwarrow politics really that...” Bella makes a gesture with her hands when her brain fails to provide an adequate descriptor word.

“I don't know what hobbit politics is like, but dwarrow politics can be very vexing. There's the council, who think they know it all because they have very high opinions of themselves,” Dis started explaining as they left the Royal Wing, the guards damn near noiselessly falling into place around them and the girls. “And then there are the guild masters; they think themselves the kings of their own little fiefdoms with their guildhalls and workshops. And Mahal forbid a guild war breaks out. They become even more insufferable then.”

“Oh, lovely,” Bella remarked dryly.

“The guilds are just a bunch of blowhards and if you know how to manage them it's almost as easy as breathing. At any rate, with Dori now back in the mountain, I'll have someone at my back when knocking heads becomes necessary.”

“Is 'knocking heads' one of the duties of the head of the Exchequer?” Bella inquired dryly.

Dis snorted, hard. “Oh, I do like your sense of humor. And, no, but I do make it a part of my duties as an overseer of the guilds with Dori – another duty we came to share. You will come to find, Bella, that sometimes nothing works so well as throwing a heavy something at a ridiculously stubborn fool.”

“Oh,” Bella started, losing herself to a chuckle for a long moment whilst the girls looked askance at their mother. “I do already know that one.”

“Really? Do tell,” Dis inquired as they moved into the already raucously noisy, quite full hall.

The noise level, which had dampened some upon the entry of Bella, Dis, and the girls, quickly picked back up when the dwarrow who had noticed them turned their attention back to their plates and their food, something Bella found herself grateful for. She knew she would have to get used to it, given the role she had (tacitly) agreed to take on, but still. As they themselves traverse the hall to what is clearly the royal table, Bella tells Dis how she does, in fact, know the value of chucking something at a dwarf.

Dis' laughter during and after the tale is not quiet, by any stretch of the imagination. Though one could hardly fault the woman for laughing at her brother and the discomfort he had wrought upon himself.

“Oh, that fool,” Dis laughs as the chuckles die down and they seat themselves (and the girls between them) at the table. “Thorin is a Durin and the men of my family can be such fools sometimes. I trust he learned his lesson?”

Bella waits until the servants who brought platters of meat piled high and trencher dishes of seasoned vegetables and cauldrons full of still bubbling, fragrant soups have gone back to the kitchens before answering Dis; a lingering sense of 'hobbit-y propriety' (Kili and Fili's words) making her a little leery of discussing matters private or personal within earshot of those she did not know.

“I do believe he did. Later on that very same day this massive – and I do, truly, mean massive – arrangement of flowers arrived at Bag End – my smial,” Bella starts pulling things from the dishes and putting them on plates for the girls, who were eyeing the food in front of them hungrily.

“It was so big we couldn't see Paddy Chubb behin' it!” Eglantine butted in, holding her arms as far apart as they would go to demonstrate the size of the flower arrangement to Dis, nearly smacking her sister in the face into the bargain.

“Yeah, he sounded like he was moving one'a Farmer Maggots huuuuge pumpkins when he carried it in the smial!” Thora added, apparently not wanting to be outdone by her sister.

Bella smiled at the girls before sticking a plate in front of each and helping them tie some linen squares around their necks in an effort to prevent staining.

“The girls are not wrong. It was comprised of several different varieties of flower; I believe, based on something Thorin had said to me a few days previously, that he was trying in his own way to address the issue and apologize the way a hobbit might.”

“Did he even come close?” Dis asked with a twinkle in her eye as she gently pulled the knife and fork out of Eglantine's hands and helped the young girl cut her meat and the larger pieces of vegetable into smaller, child-friendly size pieces.

“Not... Not quite,” Bella hedged with a smile as she cut up Thora's food for her, “But he did indeed apologize for not consulting me or even mentioning it.”

“Oh, he wrote you a note as well as sending flowers? That's very thorough.”

“He didn't leave me any note to be delivered with the flowers. You see, hobbits – for I don't know if other races do it – tend to ascribe certain meanings and words and phrases to flowers. Thorin's apology was contained in those flowers.”

“My, my, that is rather clever of my brother,” Dis declared. “May I ask – what did the flowers say?”

“They were, more or less, 'I'm sorry for what I did and I realize/recognize that it wasn't right for me to do so,'” Bella answered with a shrug before she tackled her own plate of food.

“And... he said it with flowers? How?”

“You would have to ask Thorin?”

“Ask Thorin what? Ask Thorin why Mahal cursed him with such a sister?”

“Oh, hello, brother dear. The councilors behaved themselves well, did they?” Dis asked, turning to a-fix her brother with a beaming smile as he threw himself into the seat next to Bella and began filling a plate with the closest food to him; but not before he leaned forward to shoot Dis with another sour glower.

“Hello, Papa,” Eglantine greeted Thorin, stopping just long enough to greet her father with a mouth full of food.

“Eglantine, what have I told you before about talking with your mouth full?” Bella asked the suddenly slightly contrite little girl.

Eglantine had the smarts to chew and then swallow the mouthful before answering. “To not to.”

“And why do we not speak to others with our mouth full of partially chewed food?”

“Because it's... it's uncouf. And gross.”

“Uncouth, but yes, you are correct on that sweetheart. It is indeed also gross. Now, shall we try that again?”

Eglantine turned in her seat and looked at Thorin “Hello, Papa.”

“Good afternoon, Eglantine. How's your lunch?”

“Yummy!” Eglantine responded with a big, toothy grin. Right before she attacked a piece of ham in a way that seemed thoroughly dwarrow.

“Oh, we are going to have to work on this,” Bella mumbled to herself, giving Eglantine and the way she was eating the ham some side-eye.

“Our daughter's manners are not up to hobbit levels of decorum?” Thorin asked Bella, a rather cheeky twinkle appearing in his eyes.

Bella did not deign to make a response, instead tossing a balled up napkin at Thorin's face. He batted it aside with a laugh, something that did not go amiss by many with a view of the royal table.

Other members of the Company trickle in over the course of the lunch and the table becomes ever livelier and noisier. In some ways, it felt to Bella like that long ago dinner party at Bag End. And she enjoyed herself at lunch, conversing with Dis, Thorin and the others, asking questions about things and wondered why she had ever despaired of an atmosphere such as this.

Once the girls have been distracted by dessert (a delectable looking and heavenly smelling crispy apple truffle), the talk turns to the matters that had occupied Thorin and Balin's morning. There's some of it Bella does not understand, but Thorin's disgust with his council (and Balin's slighty better concealed feelings of the same vein) are understood easily enough.

“I still don't understand why you don't just can the bastards,” Dwalin grumped before shovelling an incredibly loaded forkful of food into his mouth. “They're all right useless and hardly have the mountain's best interest at heart. Self-interest, maybe. But not the mountain’s.”

“You know perfectly well why, brother,” Balin sighed as he reached for a large pewter jug, refilling his own cup from it. “For one thing, we are only five years out from Erebor's reclamation; we're still in a far too precarious position to oust any of the council. For another, there are a few who aren't completely... useless. Not to mention the–“

“Trade treaties and fortunes and fragile egos, yes, yes, I'm well aware. You've mentioned this foolishness once or twice,” Dwalin grimaced in a way that lead Bella to believe that it hadn't been only 'once or twice' Balin had brought this up.

“Believe me, Dwalin; if I had my way I would have sacked the council at the first opportunity for a variety of reasons, not just because of their total lack of use,” Thorin joins in now, having been able to get some food and drink in him has gone a ways to soothing his riled temper from the morning.

“I know hardly a thing about dwarrow politics, but it seems to me that your society in general does not have much use for anything that's 'useless.'” Bella ventured.

“It's the sheer weight of generations of tradition currently maintaining the status quo, that and the mountain's current fragility,” Thorin sighed. “Things have always been done this way and the exalted – Shut up sniggering Dwalin – members of the council have gotten far too comfortable with the way things were and are. They are...” Thorin paused as he searched for a way to explain or a turn of phrase that would help.

“The members of the King's council are rather like rocks that have been in a river forever – they hardly notice the flow of the water,” Bella tries not to jump too badly at the sudden appearance (seemingly out of nowhere, how did he do _that_?) of Nori, who, she does not fail to notice, slips a piece of paper into the pocket of Thorin's surcoat on the way to his seat. “Also, I knew a chap back in the Blue Mountains who said that tradition was just peer pressure from dead people. You want to sack the council because they're awful people? Then sack them, Your Majesty.”

“Well, that's... that's... Alright, that's not entirely inaccurate,” Balin admits. “But the fact remains that it still isn't as simple as we would all like it to be.”

“All this cyclical talk is making my head hurt,” Dis groaned. “If we cannot sack them, in the immediate future, then I want no one to complain when I start throwing things at the council. Because I will start at the next one, just you watch.”

By the end of the lunch, and after much argument ("We're debating." "Oh, is that what it's called when you toss trenchers at your friends in front of your children?" "...Yes.") they appear no closer to resolving the frustrating situation surrounding the council. Bella ends up agreeing with Nori's point of view, but she doesn't really want to put her two cents in on a subject she's not terribly knowledgeable about. It's also abundantly clear that this is not a new argument, so Bella mostly tunes it out and focuses on keeping an eye on the girls and making sure they don't get into mischief. Or drown in the gravy boat. She winds up being more successful with the former than the latter.

One not so quick jaunt back to their quarters to change clothes after lunch remedies this, though.

"So, I was thinking our next port of call could be the library," Dis suggested as she fastened the ties on Eglantine's pinafore and smoothed her curls.

"That sounds like a rather excellent idea, what with the work men still doing their work out in my garden. There wasn't much of an opportunity last time to do much more than poke one's head in and verify that 'yes, this is a library.' From what I recall it was very dusty."

"From what I heard, it was indeed. But, come, you'll see for yourself."

The path Dis took to get to the library saw them cutting through the grand entrance hall before cutting down some side passages that, while less grandly carved because these weren't passages for showing off, were still beautifully decorated.

"Are these murals telling a story?" Bella asked, gesturing to the one they were currently passing.

"Mm? Oh, yes," Dis answers, backtracking a few steps and peering at the multi-panel mural. "It's actually a story we tell our children -- one of those ones with a moral or a lesson to be learned at the end. It's a little hard to tell because several of the panels have sustained damage, but it looks like one of my favorites from when I was a girl. Thorin and Frerin hated it, as I recall."

At this, a seed of an idea takes root in Bella's mind and begins to germinate. But for now, it's just a little thing, so Bella puts the idea to one side.

Both of the girls pepper Dis with questions about her favorite stories when she was their age, what were the things she liked to play with most, favorite foods; a list of questions long enough to last until they reached the library.

"What is it with dwarrow and covering every surface in some sort of super elaborate carvings?" Bella asked as the guards who had been walking in front of them opened the double doors that marked the rather grand entrance to the library.

"It's a tradition that stems back to before our people recorded our words on parchment and stone," Dis explained with a laugh."

Though, Bella admitted to herself as they passed through them, the doors were things of beauty. They were a dark, rich mahogany, with mithril edging the doors and framing the geometric depictions of books and folios and scrolls. The handles from a distance had definitely to Bella looked like some kind of iridescent, coruscating shell edged in bright silver. Bella identifies it when she gets closer as abalone shell, a material so rare back in the Shire that only the Thane's wife had had a comb decorated with it.

"They are very pretty doors, though," Bella remarked.

"Thorin was prepared to shoot this design idea down with prejudice," Dis told Bella. "Went on and on about the materials and the way they were to be used being too 'elven.' Up until one of the more open-minded craftsmen made mention of how 'fine and well-worked' the doors to Thranduil's own library were. Thorin couldn't sign off fast enough after that."

"Did you tell her about the one who suggested the doors be made out of marble?" Nori asked, popping up out of nowhere and taking at least three years off of Bella's life for the suddenness of his appearance.

"_Stop doing that_!" Bella vehemently chastised Nori while the girls laughed at their mother's reaction.

"The element of surprise is the greatest of them all," Nori said, a tad nonsensically.

"You are impossible. At any rate, what was this about marble doors?"

"Last year, when the construction committees were meeting and discussing style and materials we could use for the doors, one craftsman suggested marble.

"The hall fell silent and stayed this way for a few moments until a fellow of the first said 'Absolutely not. I will not live in a mountain with doors made of that floofy elven shite.'" Nori promptly answered Bella, making it clear with his choice of 'shite' that the last word had very obviously NOT been shite. Bella appreciated his attempt at censoring anyway.

"Well, then. That is a very definite opinion on marble," Bella said, getting distracted now by the sight of bookshelves upon bookshelves and lecterns and fat pillar candles that promised hours and hours of reading time.

But she is not so far gone that she doesn't notice Dis lagging behind to ask Nori if he has any particular reason for his sudden appearance. And she might not hear everything but she does hear Nori relay something in a lower tone of voice.

The head librarian is a woman with a rather prodigious and imressive set of whiskers that have been braided back off her face into her own hair, to keep them out of the ink and charcoal if Bella had to guess. She looks so similar to Bombur that Bella would bet good money on this dwarrowdam hailing from the Broadbeam clan. And moments later, Bella's supposition that the woman is a Broadbeam is proven correct moments later when said dwarrowdam looks up and notices their presence.

"Oh, hello! My goodness, I wasn't expecting such fine visitors in the library today! I am Tolur, at your service," She excitedly performed a little bow to their group. "I am cousin to Bifur, Bofur, and Bombur."

"It's lovely to meet you, Tolur. I am Bella Baggins, I am at your service, and these are my daughters -- Eglantine and Thora," Bella responded in kind, returning the bow Tolur had made -- much to Tolur's delight.

"Tolur, are there any areas of the library that we should avoid?" Dis asked, gently cutting off the dwarrowdam before she could delight herself into a faint.

"Well, we're still waiting on workers to come and check the structural integrity of the passthrough to the Little Library; but other than that, feel free to roam wherever you please."

"I, in fact, know of where there are some rather lovely picture books," Nori suggests to Thora and Eglantine, "that I think two little girls of my acquaintance might enjoy. Shall we go and seek them out?"

Both girls swing to their mother with all alacrity. "Momma, may we?"

"Yes, you may go. But mind Nori and listen to what he says!" Bella calls after the girls, who are already toddling off with Nori, grabbing his hands.

"Bella, I need to disappear for a little while, but I'll be back. In the meantime, I'm sure Tolur would be willing to help you if you should need it."

"Oh, indeed I would, Princess Dis, indeed I would," Tolur readily agreed.

"Excellent!" Exeunt: Dis.

"So, Tolur, do you enjoy your work here?"

"Yes, very much. I worked in a bookseller's in the Blue Mountains, I also helped repair books and folios that came in from my fellow dwarrow or the occasional traveler. When the call came that the Mountain had been reclaimed, I heeded the call like many others of my people. I found Bifur, Bofur, and Bombur some months after my arrival and then found myself being offered the job of librarian from Master Balin of all people. And the chance to help repair the damage wrought upon these beautiful old books by time and neglect? I could not say no."

"Oh, I completely understand. I love books myself and have some very fond memories of helping my father repair the occasional tome at our home when I was young. He was very fond of books my father. If you ever would like some help in the library, please, do let me know."

"Oh, Zainuzbad, I could never -- I would never presume to lay claims on your, I'm sure, very valuable time --"

"Tolur," Bella quickly stepped in, the faster to cut off poor Tolur's waffling "Books are a passion of mine. I'm sure that there is still much work to be done in a library as large and grand as this, even years on. It would be a pleasure to be able to help restore, maybe even translate. Of course, I would never wish to impose upon you --"

“Oh, it would be no imposition, Zainuzbad, no imposition at all!” Tolur just as quickly cuts Bella off as Bella had her.

“Well, then, it's settled,” Bella said, with a bright smile. “And you said that you are still waiting upon workers to inspect the structural integrity of the doorway to the Little Library?”

“Yes, zainuzbad, the Little Library.”

“I'll see what I can do for you and the others here in that line.”

Bella and Tolur speak for a few minutes more on books in general, the history of Erebor's Libraries themselves, how long Tolur and her colleagues estimate the repair work to go on for, until Bella hears her name quietly being called by Nori.

“Excuse me,” Bella says to Tolur and heads off to find Nori.

She finds him on a couch that looks like it's in sore need of reupholstering, Eglantine tucked into the crook of his arm fast asleep, and Thora is curled up into Nori's hip, pillowing her head on his thigh.

“Ah,”

“Yeah. Started reading to them from this really old copy of _'Bolin and the Three Forges'_ and then found this old book of nursery rhymes – I can still vaguely remember our mum singing them to Ori and me when we were babes in the cradle. Thora's very fond of _'The Hammer and the Anvil Jumped Over the Lava,'_ by the way. And before I got halfway through, they were asleep."

“I had wondered if they mightn't do something like this,” Bella mused as she stepped forward and very carefully picked up Thora, freeing up Nori to put the book down and smoothly get up from the couch still holding Eglantine with nary a readjust. “Best take them up to their room so they can nap in an actual bed.”

“I was just thinking that, m'self.”

The guards, who had all waited patiently at the front of the library, fall into step around Nori and Bella as they make their way back up to the Royal Wing. Both girls slumber on and through being slipped under their blankets, barely moving even when Bella pressed her daughter's favorite bedtime companions into their hands.

Once the door to Eglantine and Thora's room is shut, and once they make it to her drawing room, and once Bella safely ascertains that the workmen have departed, done for the day (and checking out what work had been done was next on Bella's list), Bella turns to Nori.

“Is there something going on that I need to be made aware of?”


	3. An Inkling of Things

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things are a-rumbling in the distance...
> 
> And there is a great deal of discussion about cabbage.

“What leads you to the conclusion that something is afoot, my most suspicious queen?”  
  
Bella fixed Nori with the most unimpressed look she could muster just then.  
  
“You slipped a piece of paper into Thorin’s pocket at lunch. Then Dis suddenly leaves and I saw her looking like a thundercloud on the way back here; also, Thorin never went back to council after lunch -- I heard a few members grousing about this ‘irregularity.’ AND. An extra three guards joined us on the way back.”  
  
“They joined the back of the detail!”  
  
“Why does everyone seem to think hobbits are about as perspicacious as a moss-covered rock?” Bella shot back at Nori.  
  
“Well… I can’t really answer that question, Bella.”  
  
“Nori. What. Is. Going. On?"  
  
A small staring contest occurs, Bella on one side of the couch in her drawing-room, Nori the other. The room is silent, but for the merry popping and crackling of the large fire burning in the hearth. Bella is very much unwilling to let this go, but Nori is also unwilling to reveal much.  
  
With a sigh (and an eyebrow that got increasingly closer to Bella’s hairline the longer this stare-off went on), Nori caves.  
  
He was so going to tell Thorin that Hobbit Stink-Eye was No. Joke.  
  
“The piece of paper I slipped into Thorin’s pocket was the location for him to come to. One of my agents came to me, and I went to Thorin.”  
  
“About?”  
  
“Nothing nice, I can promise you that,” Nori said with derision. “This particular thing was potential threats made against you and the girls. Said in such a way that you couldn’t exactly say they were threats -- it’s a sport amongst dwarrow nobility, I swear, to twist words ‘round. But they are also… how do I say this … They are being quite vocal about being presented with physical proof in the form of you and the children, that Thorin went to someone, not a dwarf if you catch m’meaning.”  
  
“They’re complaining and insinuating that my children are also not his. Is that what you’re more or less saying?”  
  
“Unfortunately, yes. The ridiculousness I brought Thorin in on was particularly repulsive.”  
  
“We’ve been back in the mountain for two days, and already there are complaints?”  
  
“I wouldn’t say ‘complaints’ per se, but talk is starting. My brother was not wrong about the dwarrow capacity for gossip.”  
  
“Nori, these are the sorts of things, _as Thora and Eglantine’s mother_, that I need to be kept informed of!”  
  
“I know, I know. But it was hard enough to get you to agree to come back. And I’m pretty sure that, had the Ironfists not started sniffing around The Shire, you wouldn’t have returned with us. Which, is obviously your right. Oh, Mahal do I know. Ori showed me the legal precedence last night and then spent an hour lecturing me and Dori on the finer points.”  
  
“You’re not seeing the finest of the dwarrow at the moment,” Dis said as she came into the room. “And right now, those three nobles are on house arrest with the biggest, burliest, meanest, and most loyal guards Dwalin’s got to guard the entrances and exits to their manses. Thorin’s mulling over what exactly to do with them. Right now, he’s in a black mood and favoring chopping off a beard and a body part. That’s also why I’m here. He sends his apologies, Bella. But his mood is exceptionally foul at the moment, so you won’t be seeing him until tonight at least when he’s calmed down. A few hours of him and Dwalin going at each other in practice should do the trick for now.”  
  
“I appreciate you telling me. And Thorin for knowing his limits,” Bella answered in the appreciative, wrapping her arms around her middle as if to ward off a chill.  
  
“You should have been told, I did tell the dolt that,” Dis promised Bella, putting a hand on the hobbit’s shoulder. “He just wants, what all the lads want, especially those nephews of mine, and myself… Thorin wants to keep you and the girls safe.”  
  
“I know. I know, I do. It just feels quite frustrating to be kept in the dark like I’m some soft thing who could not handle a situation such as this.”  
  
“You may have to repeat that to Thorin more than once; the males of our line are quite thick when they want to be. Also, maybe back up that assertion with hitting him with a heavy object from time to time. I’m told your accuracy when throwing is quite high, so that’s in your favor. Where are the girls, by the way?”  
  
“Napping in their room. Apparently, Nori is quite the storyteller, combine that with still recovering from traveling all the way from the Shire… well, you understand. Speaking of the library, Dis, could you tell me who I need to speak with about checking its structural integrity?”  
  
“Uh… Off the top of my head, I’m not sure. Though, if anyone could tell you it would be Balin, I’m sure.”  
  
“Good, good. Whoever it is I need to have a word with them about the library. Maybe see if we can’t bump it a few -- or several -- notches up the list.”  
  
“May I ask why?”  
  
“Tolur tells me that the pass-through to the Little Library has yet to be checked. And that means that any of the books or parchments in there have yet to be evaluated and re-cataloged.”  
  
“Well, the books were not a super high priority, to be honest, Bella,” Nori admitted as he tossed a log onto the fire before grabbing a poker to stoke the blaze higher. Bella did rather enjoy the ensuing wash of heat that surged into the room.  
  
“Oh, of course, I do understand,” Bella agreed as she picked up a toy one of the girls had left on the floor earlier and placed it on a convenient side table. “But it’s been going on six years now. I’ll also be spending some of my time there -- what I did see of the library today indicated that it’s rather large and has many volumes. But that also means the girls will spend time there, too. And you know full well how curious they can get.”  
  
“No, that is a good point.”  
  
A moment later, one of the guards stepped into the room and addressed Nori. “There is someone waiting outside the Royal Wing to see you, Master Nori. A ginger-blonde female, says she has something for your ears alone.”  
  
Nori nodded. “Tell her I’ll be there in a moment.” The guard nodded and withdrew, closing the door with a gentle click of the latch.  
  
“That’ll be Calico. Must be serious for her to approach so openly. Bella, Dis, I’ll see you later.”  
  
“Any idea what that could be about?” Bella asked Dis.  
  
“None whatsoever. Nori’s job is the most… shadowy and he doesn’t talk about his work often. Or, ever, actually.”  
  
Later, after Dis had gone to answer some correspondence in her study, Bella more or less ended up pottering around the space that was now hers. Finding a folio of some loose sheets of parchment in a random drawer (she has suspicions that Thorin ordered this -- you know, have writer things around for her, that sort of thing), Bella then liberated some crayons from Thora’s trunk and headed for the space that would some day in the near future be her garden.  
  
There was a cool breeze running along the parapet as Bella sat on a bench (when had that arrived?) with her back to the sun-warmed stone of the mountain itself, facing the garden, and began to sketch. It occasionally tugged at a corner of the parchment, but no more than that. Though the occasional stronger gust that sporadically burst through did make her glad for the shawl she had grabbed on the way out as an afterthought.  
  
Bella lost herself in the sketching and the planning of the garden. Taking time to look up every so often and make note of where the light was or where it looked like it would be best at this time of day, or how and where the breeze might cause the most problems, and she drew plans.  
  
“Thought I might find you out here,” a voice said, jerking Bella from her little bubble with a jump of surprise.  
  
“With the girls napping, I found I had some time on my hands, so why not get started with the garden planning?”  
  
Fili stopped leaning out from behind the door and came fully out into the garden with a smile at the way his aunt had jumped when he had spoken.  
  
“I thought I’d pop back up here and imagine my non-surprise to find my cousins passed out like the dead and snoring away in their beds and my favorite aunt drawing in her garden. Can I look at these ones?” Fili asks pointing at a small, neat pile of paper on the grass next to Bella.  
  
“If you like,” Bella responded, shuffling over on the bench so Fili could join her and going back to her sketching as he picked up the small pile and began to peruse them with “Have the girls woken up from their nap?”  
  
“I checked in on them after hearing about this nonsense before coming to find you and they were still out cold. Thora snores like a full-grown dwarf many times her age.”  
  
Bella snorted as she corrected a misplaced line on the sketch she was working on.  
  
“She would tell you that she does not snore; instead she would say she purrs with the force of ten thousand kittens through her nose.”  
  
Fili let out a loud guffaw at that one. “Where on Arda did she pick up that one?”  
  
“I believe it was Adalgrim; his wife was complaining at him about his snoring keeping her up a night at a party and that was his retort. I’ve never seen Betha’s mouth snap shut so fast in my life.”  
  
“I can imagine. Hey, what are these squiggly looking things here?”  
  
“Fruit trees. Once they’re tall enough, old enough and have deep enough root systems they would make nice windbreaks if planted by the windows.”  
  
“Ah, I see. I think.”  
  
“Fruit trees need a lot of sunshine. And a lot of water, come to think of it. I’ll probably have to amend those to fruit trees that can live in large pots; I imagine it would be a great deal of work to get an irrigation system put into this garden.”  
  
“Mm, probably. I mean, it might also take many explosives to break through the mountain, too.”  
  
“Yes, definitely pots.” Bella murmured distractedly, jotting down some notes on the edge of the paper. “With the right planning, I can definitely grow quite a few vegetables in all this space.”  
  
“Vegetables?”  
  
Bella laughed at both the disgusted tone of voice and look on Fili’s face. The dwarrow still held great antipathy toward vegetables, how very not surprising.  
  
“Eating vegetables every once in a while will absolutely not kill you lot, you know. One cannot live off a diet of meat and ale alone.”  
  
“I dunno, there are generations of dwarrow that could prove you wrong, I think, auntie.”  
  
“And I am willing to bet you that at least some of those dwarrow had deficiencies of some sort. For example, scurvy. It’s a not very fun illness that happens when one has a diet deficient in the right fruits and vegetables. Also, while hobbits do eat meat, our diets are very heavy in fruits and vegetables, also something that I don’t plan on changing any time soon. I also plan on making use of that kitchen because it would be a _travesty_ not to.”  
  
“So, we’ll be eating more greens and vegetables, won’t we.”  
  
“Of course!”  
  
“I don’t like green food.”  
  
“You’ve been spending far too much time with Ori.”  
  
“Dwarrow don’t really doooo vegetables, though. We eat meat, we grow strong.”  
  
“Bifur.”  
  
“Touche, auntie.”  
  
It was a few minutes after that when Bella had decided to take herself indoors and peruse the cabinets to see what could be scrounged up for tea, having sent Fili to go and wake the girls (“I don’t want to. Nori got sworn at last time.” “Too bad, go do it, please and thank you.”) from their nap.  
  
Quite pleased with her finds, Bella sets to the task of cooking for tea, and had just put a pot on the stove to heat with water, sugar, and berries in it to cook down into a simple kind of compote when Fili comes into the kitchen, leading his two sleepy cousins by the hand.  
  
“Have a nice nap, my darlings?” Bella asked, stopping her current task of chopping some vegetables to greet the girls, who came over for sleepy hugs.  
  
“Yes, m’ma,” Eglantine mumbled into her mother’s skirts. “‘M hungry, though.”  
  
“M’too,” Thora seconded.  
  
“Well, don’t worry, I’m working on getting tea started. And while that’s happening… here,” Bella grabbed some little tomatoes still on the vine and handed them to Thora and Eglantine. “A little something to snack on.”  
  
“They’re cold,” Thora stated, looking up at her mother, a quite perplexed expression on her face.  
  
“They were in cold storage to help keep them fresher longer, sweetheart,” Bella patiently explained. “At least, I think that thing is cold storage.”  
  
“It is,” Fili answered. “Only we call it an icebox. Either term obviously works, though. Rather an ingenious piece of dwarrow engineering, really.”  
  
“If it means I can keep ingredients close by and not have to go trekking to and fro to gather things for a meal, I am allll for it,” Bella said as the girls, having accepted the explanation from Fili went off and clambered up onto the benches that lined the side of the small table that was in the kitchen.  
  
“Naturally. And what is that leafy thing that looks as if it is going to or could fly off the counter and eat my face?” Fili asked this last with a face that was at once both truly disgusted and wary.  
  
“That one is collard greens and that is Savoy cabbage. And bless whoever stocked that icebox. So many vegetables,” Bella said with a blissful smile.  
  
“The letter Thorin sent me that contained the instructions that I was to prepare the queen’s quarters with all haste for you and the girls, also instructed that the kitchen needed to be refurbished -- we’d not been using it since the Reclamation -- and stocked with ingredients that I thought would be pleasing to someone of a hobbit’s palette,” Dis answered as she walked into the kitchen, dropping a kiss a piece onto Thora’s and Eglantine’s heads as she passed by them.  
  
“Uncle Thorin made a good choice. But that cabbage looks like a monster from a dwarrow’s nightmares.”  
  
“It’s quite tasty when cooked right and I promise you are not sentient in the slightest," Bella reassured Fili, having a small internal battle with herself to keep a smile off her face.  
  
“I’m willing to try most vegetables if I know you’re cooking them. Or Bombur is. But that one… I dunno.”  
  
“You faced down one of the evilest bastards of our age and a weird looking cabbage is freaking you out?” Dis asked her son, one eyebrow cocked high on her forehead.  
  
“We all have our weaknesses, amad,” Fili said loftily.  
  
“You know, I should like to take a trip to the market someday soon, to see what is available. I remember one of the lads saying something about there being three or four in the mountain?”  
  
“There are three, but there was talk last month of adding a fourth market closer to the mines.” Dis supplied. “If there was anything you think I missed, I would be more than happy to not go to the council meeting tomorrow and show you the way to the market closest to here; it’s where I got most of the vegetables that are in the cold storage now.”  
  
“Oh, I’m sure you did fine, Dis,” Bella reassured Dis as she grabbed the head of cabbage and started pulling leaves off it, all while staring down Fili, who was still looking wary of the vegetable currently being disassembled. “Oooh, do we have a meat grinder?”  
  
“....No?” Fili awkwardly dragged the word out of his mouth, lilting the word into sounding like a question.  
  
“Dare I ask why you would need one?” Dis asked with a pointed glance to Fili.  
  
“Well, seeing those jars of grains I’d not noticed before and having a cabbage literally in my hands has given me an idea --”  
  
“G’lumpki!” Thora crowed from the table.  
  
“Yes, what Thora more or less said,” Bella said. “And judging by the twin looks of confusion, neither of you knows what that is, am I correct?”  
  
“We have no idea,” Fili answered for him and his mother.  
  
“Galumpkis is a wonderful comfort food dish. It’s a mixture of meat, onions, and spices, it’s wrapped up in a cabbage leaf and cooked in a sort of tomato sauce. It’s a bit late to have for tea, I suppose… but I could prep them now and cook them for dinner…” Bella muses mostly to herself, chewing on her lip in thought.  
  
“I’ll go and see if there’s one Bombur can spare from the kitchen’s,” Fili volunteers.  
  
“Please, do,” Bella urged Fili.  
  
“Can I help in any way?” Dis asked as Fili left the room.  
  
“If you would like to, yes, I would appreciate the help. Go wash your hands and -- do you know how to chop onions without crying?”  
  
“Outside and not in an enclosed space?”  
  
“I’ll show you a trick my mother showed me that works a treat every time,” Bella promised. While Dis moves to the sink and begins washing her hands, Bella quickly tends to the merrily bubbling fruit and sugar mixture on the stove, giving it a good stir before lowering the heat as best as she is able so it won’t burn.  
  
By the time Fili returns from the mountain kitchens with a meat mincer and a guard in tow carrying a nice haunch of beef, Bella and Dis have between them chopped up everything going into the galumpkis that needs to be and the rice is cooking away on the stovetop next to the berry compote that has just had some cinnamon added and taken off the heat.  
  
“Oh, excellent!” Bella cheerily exclaimed. “Just let me move this -- and set the meat there if you could.”  
  
“Of course, zainuzbad.” The guard answers, respectfully inclining his head before depositing the grinder on the counter and leaving with another bow of the head.  
  
Bella moves straight to butchering the beef into more manageable sized pieces and feeding them into the meat grinder and as she is doing this, Fili is cutting up the fresh spices (having had a knife pointed at him by his mother and then pointedly at the spices).  
  
Nori manages to materialize at some point during the preparation of tea and before he can so much as sneeze or twitch more than a finger in the direction of the fresh out of the oven tarts, Bella delivers a smart smack to the back of his hand with a wooden spoon.  
  
“Touch those only if you’re sure you wish to endure blisters and pain in your mouth for a good long while,” Is the only warning Bella gives.  
  
“I was not about to attempt to filch a tart from my queen’s kitchen,” Nori plays the wide-eyed innocent and naturally fools no one, but amuses Thora and Eglantine, who had watched the whole exchange while quietly giggling. The giggling gets all the louder when Nori adds on, “And I am hurt that you would level such suspicion and threats at me, my usually most gracious and benevolent majesty.”  
  
“Oh, dear Yavanna, I think I may gag from the saccharine falseness of that tripe, Nori,” Bella complains, rolling her eyes ceiling-ward. “But, while you’re here, would you mind getting the word out to the Company that tea is almost ready and their presence would be greatly appreciated?”  
  
“Aye, I can manage that, I think,” Nori responds with a cheeky smile before departing just as silently as he appeared.  
  
“Oi! That sneaky toad nicked one of the tarts!” Bella exclaimed with no small amount of annoyance.  
  
~~~~~~~~  
  
Dwarrow lauded and praised themselves for their ability to sniff out veins of fine metals and gems, but Bella had always thought their ability to sense when mealtime was near coming a close second. And she feels thusly because just as she was pulling things out to be served for tea, they started to arrive in small groups. Kili showed up with Gloin. Then Bifur, Bofur, Bombur, and Bombur’s wife and daughter. Then Oin and Dori. While Dis was roping others into helping set out the silverware and plates, Balin and Ori showed up with Nori close behind.  
  
Both Balin and Ori showed remarkable agility when Bella chucked a pillow from a settee over their heads at Nori, catching the spymaster in the face.  
  
“You know what that was for.”  
  
“It was worth it,” Is all Nori says, still smug as you please. “The cinnamon was a lovely touch, for the record.”  
  
“You aren’t getting another one after tea, just so you’re aware.”  
  
“Yeah, Mr. Nori, it’s not nice to steal tarts,” Thora reprimands Nori, and Bella would make a remark about how terribly sweet it is that her daughter is reprimanding a fully grown dwarf (and also how it’s more than a little hypocritical), but she says nothing because Thora is doing her very best to look ever so fierce, staring Nori down with her little fists on her waist, brows quirked down into a strong little v shape.  
  
There’s also a lot of ill-concealed giggling and snorting going on behind Bella at this point.  
  
“But, dear ones, do you know how long its been since I’ve had one of your mum’s delicious home-baked cakes?”  
  
“Since we left The Shire in the spring,” Eglantine cheekily pointed out.  
  
“They’ve both got you there,” Dori chuckled as Nori opened and closed his mouth a few times, searching for something, anything, to say in response.  
  
“Girls, now that you have settled this matter with Nori, go wash your hands. And anyone else who was working, please go wash your hands as well.”  
  
“Hobbits are very clean creatures I take it?” Tonil asked while looking at her little girl, who was currently giggling as she bounced on her Uncle Bifur’s lap.  
  
“I don’t think they are more so than anyone else. I think it’s just ingrained in all hobbits at this point to just make their children wash their hands before a meal since they’ve been out and about and got into Yavanna knows what before coming home.”  
  
“It is a sound practice. Back in the Blue Mountains, the amount of dirt my sister’s husband tracked in after working the mines all day was almost unholy some days,” Tonil said with a nod.  
  
After being lifted down from the stool that had been provided for the girls so that they could reach the sink, both of them came toddling over to their mother, holding out their hands, “Our hands are washed, amad, see?”  
  
“I do see, darlings. Why don’t you go find your seats at the table?” Bella indicated that direction with a tilt of her chin as she handled a bowl full of a salad she had quickly whipped up and carried it toward the said table.  
  
In no time at all, the table is laid up with the food and Bella and Balin, who had offered his help, are carrying two large pots of tea and setting them down on ceramic plates (so the beautiful wood of the table does not get scorched).  
  
“There’s no need to stand on ceremony, so everyone just serve yourselves,” Bella said with a wave that encompassed the table as she started serving up food for the girls.  
  
Both girls clamber up onto the bench seat and sit there, patiently waiting but watching the plates Bella carries in each hand like two avaricious hawks.  
  
“Honestly,” Bella huffed. “You two, you would think I hardly fed you some times.”  
  
“We’re growing, amad. We needs --”  
  
“Need,” Thora interrupted, correcting her sister in a manner that was slightly reminiscent of their mother.  
  
“We need alllllll the food, we do,” Eglantine swore. Finishing her sentence after sticking her tongue out at her sister, of course.  
  
“Uh, huh,” Bella deadpanned, eyeing her two as she set the plates down in front of them. And no sooner had Bella turned around to go and fix her own plate, Bofur’s there with a plate piled high with food that the dwarrow clearly considered the more tempting and appetizing to a hobbit’s palate.  
  
“Thank you, Bofur,” Bella said, taking the plate and smiling up at her friend before she notices his brother over his shoulder. “Oh, Bombur, you don’t -- You weren’t asked for tea to serve the meal.”  
  
“No, but I don’t mind helping out,” Bombur said, handily making three plates at once without spilling anything and maintaining eye contact with Bella while he spoke.  
  
“You might as well sit down, my lady, my Bombur’s not going to shift on this,” Tonil advised Bella.  
  
“Oh, Tonil, none of this ‘my lady’ business. ‘Bella’ will do just fine.”  
  
“Alright, Bella. I recommend taking a seat and not trying to get my occasionally stubborn husband to not help,” Tonil said with a playful smile directed at her husband’s broad back.  
  
“If I weren’t occasionally stubborn, amê dazbûna would have had our daughter in the kitchens,” Bombur countered with a beautiful smile aimed at his wife.  
  
Bella vacillated for a moment, but only a moment, before turning and taking a seat pulled out for her by Dori.  
  
“Thank you, everyone, really,” Bella said as the others took their seats.  
  
“We’re only too happy to help,” Balin swore.  
  
“And with that -- dig in!” Kili declared from his seat at the table.  
  
Under the general din and hubbub that multiple dwarrow, two small children, and a baby can make (which is a frankly astonishing amount, really), Bella overheard Dori trying to get Ori to partake in a dish of roasted vegetables Bella had made that comprised of carrots, brussel sprouts, potatoes, and broccoli.  
  
“I don’t like green food, Dori, you know that,” Ori argued. Bella had to hide her laugh by shoving a large forkful of those same roasted vegetables into her mouth. Naturally, some of the others weren’t as discreet about their amusement at the situation.  
  
“Bella, a question, the dish you’ve got in the oven -- why is the temperature so low?” Bombur asked over the hubbub a few minutes into the meal.  
  
“It’s something my mum used to do when she made galumpkis -- that dish in the oven. Cook ‘em low and slow, she liked to say. Claimed it made everything just perfect when done that way.”  
  
“And what exactly goes into making these… galumpkis?” Bombur asked.  
  
“Cabbage that terrified Fili, rice, spices, and ground beef -- thank you for the loan of the meat mincer, by the way. You wrap the rice and beef and spice mixture up in cabbage leaves and cook it in a tomato sauce.”  
  
“That sounds quite nice, actually. Minus the terrifying Fili part, anyway.” Bofur airily commented.  
  
“Cabbage, Fili? Really?” Gloin called down the table, eyebrow impressively cocked in high incredulity.  
  
“Wait til you see it,” Fili grumbled darkly, stabbing with a little more vigor than strictly necessary at a piece of meat on his plate.  
  
~~~~~~~~  
  
The rest of the evening and supper and dinner pass with no sighting of Dwalin or Thorin. By the time Bella and Dis give the girls a bath and put them to bed, there’s still no sign of them. Bella fixes up plates for both of them and puts them into the oven to stay warm and leaves instruction with the guards to tell them both about the food left for them when they return, and then she retires for the evening.  
  
But sleep is evasive and elusive and every other synonym under the moon on this night. After the third distant toll of the bell that marked time for the mountain, Bella gave up and rose from the bed, donned her dressing gown and went to the kitchen thinking she might make herself some tea or cocoa.  
  
Some tea is found and Bella’s busy filling the kettle when she hears a rustle of fabric behind her and sees a weary-looking Thorin and Dwalin walking into the kitchen, both of them pulling up short at the sight of her.  
  
“You’re up late,” Dwalin somewhat stupidly says.  
  
“I couldn’t sleep and thought I might make some tea and work on plans for my garden. Would you two like some tea?”  
  
“That would be lovely, thank you, Bella,” Thorin answered with a tired smile.  
  
“Have a seat at the table and I’ll get your dinners out,” Bella said as she put the kettle on.  
  
“We can get --”  
  
“Sit, Thorin,” Bella commanded in a tone that brooked no argument.  
  
“Let’s sit before she pulls out the stink eye. If it unnerved Nori, it’s not something either of us wants to see,” Dwalin said to Thorin, moving past him to pull a chair out and seat himself at the table.  
  
Neither Thorin or Dwalin speaks when they tuck into their food, but the appreciative grunts and noises coming out of them as they eat let Bella know how much they enjoy what she’s made.  
  
“This thing wrapped in cabbage ‘sgood,” Dwalin told Bella as she fixes up three mugs of tea.  
  
“Thank you, they were a hit at supper, too. And here’s your tea, gentlemen.”  
  
Both Dwalin and Thorin make noises that sound vaguely like ‘thank you’ but their mouths are full of food, so Bella can’t be quite sure.  
  
Bella sits at the table next to Thorin but one seat and looks over the sketches she’d brought with her from her room as a companionable silence settles over the room. Gradually, Bella becomes aware of the feeling that she’s being watched and looks up from the sketches to see both Dwalin and Thorin looking at her.  
  
“Yes?”  
  
“You were muttering in Elvish,” Thorin states, unable to keep a slight air of distaste out of his tone.  
  
“Was I?”  
  
“Yes, Bella, you were,” Dwalin seconds.  
  
“Honestly, you two. It’s just plant names, nothing more. And you have tomes in Elvish in your library, you know. And no, you are not going to order them destroyed, Thorin.”  
  
“I wasn’t going to do that!”  
  
“That is a big fat lie and you know it, Thorin Oakenshield,” Bella accused, pointing her pencil at him.  
  
“On that note, I’ll excuse myself before this domestic grows dangerous to my health. Bella, thanks for dinner and tea. See you tomorrow,” Dwalin says, getting up and depositing his dinner things in the sink and getting out of there as quickly as was seemly.  
  
“I trust practice with Dwalin went well?” Bella ventures as the door to the kitchen swings shut behind said dwarf.  
  
“It did go well.”  
  
And when those four words appear to be all Thorin is willing to say on the subject, Bella tamps down hard on the annoyed sigh wanting out of her throat. Instead, she tries for a different tact.  
  
“Thorin, I appreciate you wanting to shield the girls and myself from the less than pleasant aspects of the dwarrow, I do. But I would like to-- no, I _need_ to be kept informed of anything that pertains to the safety of our family, no matter how unpleasant. I can take anything those stuck up nobles say because they do not know me, or our daughters. Also, I’ve been called many a thing in my life just being myself.”  
  
“I know, I know,” Thorin sighed. “It’s not that I think you’re soft, but it’s just… It is incredibly insulting to me the things that were said. I am still undecided about what punishment the three shall receive and you’re right, I should consult you for your own thoughts on this repugnant topic.”  
  
“It would help if you told me what was said,” Bella gently suggested.  
  
“There was the shallow nonsense; talking about your lack of a beard and how plain you were in comparison to a dwarrowdam and that clearly meant you had either worked a strong bewitchment on me or…”  
  
“Or what?”  
  
“Or you had seduced and ‘trapped’ me by getting pregnant.”  
  
“Well, aren’t they charming,” Bella dryly responded, with a thin smile that fooled no one and certainly not Thorin.  
  
“That’s not the worst of their... verbal treason,” Thorin grimaced and knocked back the rest of his mug of tea in one go, still not making eye contact at any point since this conversation had begun. Bella moves closer and places a gentle hand on Thorin’s forearm.  
  
“Thorin you _can_ tell me. I promise I’m not going to think something foolish like… oh… I don’t know, that all dwarrow are like them.”  
  
Thorin still won’t make eye contact, but he lifts his head and looks at Bella’s hand still lying on his forearm. He takes Bella’s hand into his, feeling the smoothness of the skin as he runs a careful thumb over her knuckles. Bella stays quiet and waits for Thorin to speak when he’s ready.  
  
And when Thorin finally does speak, the guilt and the shame are thick in his voice. “They were all saying how I did not go far enough when I… I attacked you. Their opinion was that I should have throttled you and then thrown you over the battlements for theft of that damned stone.”  
  
“Oh.”  
  
Bella had _not_ been expecting to hear something quite that awful. What she had imagined Thorin might say was lost when Thorin had told her what those nobles had said; that had rushed in and wiped out any previous thought.  
  
“You see why I did not really wish to tell you,” Thorin said after a long silence had stretched between them, looking up then at Bella.  
  
“I - I do.” Bella agreed, her voice sounded a little far off and funny to her ears. “But I also appreciate you telling me, much as you may have not wanted to.”  
  
“I wanted to go in there and confront them--”  
  
“You mean stab them full of holes,” Bella interrupted, getting a small chuckle out of Thorin.  
  
“I did, I will not deny that.”  
  
“I… I think that we should both get some rest. Yes, get some rest and think about… well, everything you’ve told me tonight.”  
  
“Bella, I’m sorry things keep on being thrown at you like this, one after the other. It’s not right, it’s not like you’re an elf or something.”  
  
Now Bella was the one chuckling, weak as it sounded.  
  
“Let’s get to bed, I’ve been told that you have the three under house arrest. They’ll keep for now,” Bella suddenly felt an urgent need to get in her bed, under the covers and just _hide_.  
  
“May I see you to your chambers?” Thorin asked.  
  
“Of course.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> amê -- mine  
dazbûna -- diamond of diamonds (I think, the NKD was not kind to the chromebook I wrote this chapter on and my silly self forgot to write this down)
> 
> Playing around with dwarrow terms of endearment is fun. And I feel like they would use gemstones and metals as their terms of endearment in the way an elf would use flowers and plants or a hobbit might use a food item.


	4. How Do You Language the Speak-Speech?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bella's having a rough day. Or rough days. But there's distraction in the form of learning!

There were a few moments in his life that Kili knew he would never forget, that they would be forever imprinted upon his brain for various reasons. Meeting and falling in love with his beloved, for example. That one time he was almost skewered by a crossbow bolt because his uncle is jumpy and trigger happy, as another example. And there would never be any level of being able to forget what happened on Raven Hill. So, memories. Both good and bad. Painful and sweet.  
  
But there’s no pain like your 6-year-old cousin jumping on you (and your only warning is a sudden “Wake up, Kee!”) to wake you up and landing squarely on the old gems and drill.  
  
“Eggs, that is not the way to wake a gent up of a morning,” Kili groans after depositing his cousin somewhere else on the bed that wasn’t his body.  
  
“I knocked. Ask the guard, he opened the door for me,” Eglantine said.  
  
“I’mma fire him,” Kili grunts as he rolls over and repositions his pillow and prepares to fall asleep anew.  
  
“Kee, get up!” Eglantine cried, bouncing her little hands off his shoulder. “I’m h’ngry! So’s Thora!”  
  
“Go get your mum to make breakfast,” was the muffled retort from under Kili’s blanket.  
  
“Mummy’s still in bed, sleepin’!”  
  
“What? Still?” This got Kili to poke his head out of the blanket cocoon. “This is the third day in a row that’s happened -- that’s not like your mum at all.”  
  
“I knowwwwwww,” Eglantine groaned, dramatically flopping face-first into Kili’s blankets.  
  
“Alright, alright, go to the kitchen and wait for me,” Kili sighed as he tossed back the blankets. “But don’t touch anything!” gets yelled after Eglantine’s back as she runs out of the room.  
  
Rolling out of bed, Kili haphazardly pulls on a shirt and pads down the hallway, passing through doors and another hall until he reaches the door to Bella’s bedroom.  
  
“Bella,” Kili calls through the door as he knocks, “you up?”  
  
“...Getting there” is the sleepy, muffled reply that comes through the door.  
  
“Okay, I’ll be in the kitchen with the girls -- don’t worry, I won’t try to cook them anything, promise,” Kili assured Bella.  
  
That got a low chuckle from the other side of the door. “Thank Yavanna for that. I’ll be out shortly, Kili.”  
  
“Alright, then,” Kili cheerfully said before moving away from the door and heading for the kitchen.  
  
When Bella appears in the kitchen a few minutes later, Thora rapidly pats the seat next to her. “Sit down, mama.”  
  
“Indeed, I urge you to listen to Thora -- you look dead on your feet,” Dis says from her position in front of the stove.  
  
“Where’s -- I swear Kili was at my door a few minutes ago,” Bella says, looking around as if that will summon Kili as she takes a seat next to Thora, who promptly hugs her mother tightly around the middle. And also shows signs of turning into a limpet, too.  
  
“Morning, mama,” Thora mumbles into Bella’s side as Eglantine comes around from the other side of her sister to hug her mother, too.  
  
“Morning, my darlings,” Bella sleepily responds through a yawn.  
  
“As to your query of where Kili has disappeared off to -- I was already in the kitchen making breakfast and sent him on an errand,” Dis says, finally having the room to respond to Bella’s question.  
  
“Ah, thank you for making the girls breakfast, Dis. I don’t know what’s gotten into me as of late.”  
  
“It’s no trouble. I like to cook and have had precious little time to do it of late. Not to mention, cooking for two creatures who actually eat their food as opposed to inhaling it so that they barely taste it? Priceless,” Dis insisted. She turned from the stove in the next moment, depositing a plate of eggs, crispy bacon, some pan-roasted tomatoes, and a nicely toasted crumpet in front of Bella.  
  
“Eat,” Dis implored Bella. “Hopefully this will put some color back into those cheeks of yours.”  
  
“Thank you, it looks delicious,” Bella responded, already feeling a bit heartened at the sight of the still steaming hot food in front of her.  
  
“Here, momma, have some of this,” Eglantine urged her mother, pushing a plate brimming with fruit toward Bella. “Kee made lots cuz he wouldn’t turn on the stove.”  
  
“Thank you for sharing your fruit with me, my darlings,” Bella said as she reached for a small cluster of grapes and created a mini avalanche of cut strawberries, as several came tumbling off the plate and onto the tabletop.  
  
“Oops,” Thora giggled.  
  
“Eh, more fruit for me,” Bella said, scooping the pieces up and depositing them on her plate.  
  
Breakfast was an overall pleasant affair, truly. Both girls, without many dwarrow around to emulate their eating habits after, made very little mess and were happy enough to toddle off to play with some new carved toys that Bofur and Bifur had brought by the other day in front of the fireplace.  
  
“So, now that we are effectively alone with our after breakfast tea, what was that look about?” Bella asked Dis in a low voice.  
  
Dis, to her and Bella’s credit, did not dither or pretend that she had no idea what Bella had been speaking about. Instead, she got straight to the point. As she reached for the little stoneware jar that held some sugar, Dis started to speak.  
  
“I was wondering if you could tell me something, first. And I hope that this does not bring up anything unduly unpleasant for you. After the birth of Thora and Eglantine, did you find yourself experiencing… how do I put this? Did you often feel what could perhaps be called disproportionately sad?”  
  
“I was in a right state after the girls were born,” Bella answered, taking a sip of her tea to lubricate her suddenly dry throat. “I felt many, many things and nothing at all at the same time. I also felt so tired. So very tired. It went beyond being bone-deep tired and the only answer seemed to, at first, be to sleep all the time. Then there were days when I was able to get out of bed where I just felt sad. No explanation, I just woke up that way. It could last a few minutes or a few days, but it happened just out of the blue. Does that answer your question?”  
  
“It rather does. I remember hearing other mothers, dwarrow and humans alike, back in the Blue Mountains referring to it as the ‘baby blues.’ Some were positive that it ran in families -- pure codswallop in my opinion. Most, the non-incredibly stupid, agreed that it struck at random and there was no way of telling if a new mother would have it after the birth of their babe. Though it was unsurprising, given the great trauma their bodies had just gone through bringing a baby into the world. I imagine the… events in your life leading up to the girls’ birth might have made for a particularly difficult time for you.”  
  
“You are not wrong there,” Bella did not bother to deny. There was no point. She herself had long privately held the belief that the way things had gone down had made it worse in the long run.  
  
There was a brief pause when Thora came over to ask Bella to remove a toy that Eglantine had accidentally gotten stuck in the former’s hair. Once that situation had been successfully resolved, the conversation was quietly resumed.  
  
“It’s not just that, though. I also find myself very… nervous around some things. More so than a normal hobbit. No hobbit likes heights. We are a low to the ground people and our dwellings definitely reflect that. Not to say I was fond of heights before -- any of the company could tell you how not fond of the idea of riding a pony I was. But when I cross bridges in this mountain, I find myself getting very nervous. Almost light-headed, like when you hold your breath for too long. I also find myself thinking I’m going to fall even if I most certainly am not, or someone could come along and push me and there’s nothing there to even try and grab onto in the event of a slip or a fall or a push. The battlements, in particular, are a _great_ source of distress.”  
  
“Naturally,” Dis murmurs sympathetically.  
  
“And I find myself unsure of how to precisely deal with or overcome these things. I mean, they are all around me now. But how do I get over that?”  
  
“I don’t know if it’s getting over it so much as getting through it,” Dis mused. “But there are fixes for some of this. Like having guard rails added to the bridges and walkways that don’t have them. You know Thorin would gladly do anything that would make you happy and keep you and the girls safe.”  
  
“I know, but I do not wish to seem like I’m complaining or… or nitpicking.”  
  
Dis snorted, hard. “I promise you that he will definitely not see it that way. And, if you wish for it to not seem like it comes from you, perhaps drop it in conversation. For example, ‘Thorin, I was wondering when they were going to add some guard rails to the bridges? And would it not be safer for the girls to add them sooner than later?’ He would do anything under the sun and mountain to keep them safe.”  
  
“That is definitely an idea worth considering,” Bella mused. “And perhaps… exposure over time, done carefully, could also help.”  
  
“I absolutely agree that it might help and you, of course, will not be alone when this happens if you do not wish to be. I mean, I doubt you’ll be left alone to do something like this even if you wanted to. But they’ll at least attempt to be stealthy and not let you see them.”  
  
This time it was Bella who snorted in amusement. “I think the only one who could be successful at that is Nori. The rest are utterly _hopeless_.”  
  
“There’s a reason the dwarrow race has never really been into stealth warfare. We are not often a terribly subtle people.”  
  
And as a terribly unsubtle underscore to Dis’ words, it was at that moment Oin came charging in, Kili at his heels.  
  
“I rest my case,” Dis whispered in an undertone to Bella as both rose from the table. “It took you long enough, Kili. What was the hold-up?”  
  
“It was a job to find Oin, that’s what happened. Turned out he’d been called to the mines and I had to go pretty damn far down to find him,” Kili sort of groused, dumping Oin’s large medical bag onto the breakfast table before quickly buggering off to play with Thora and Eglantine before he could be roped into anything else.  
  
“What happened in the mines? Did anyone die?” Dis asked with some concern. Oin explained why he had been called down as he went and thoroughly washed his hands at the sink.  
  
“No, no one died. Thank Mahal for small mercies. There was an old shaft twasn’t on the blueprints. Twas poorly covered up and two poor sods found that out the hard way. They’ll live, but both of them broke their legs and one cracked some ribs on t’other when he landed on top of him. It was a nasty business. Now,” Oin quickly dried off his hands. “I was told there was some concern about you, Bella. I don’t extend this privilege to just anyone but you know if there are any concerns you can come to me any time.”  
  
“Ah,” Bella says, glancing at Kili, who had been peeping over a chair by the fire for a bit. With a yelp, he quickly dropped out of sight and the cries of laughter and play grew in volume a little after that.  
  
“Be glad it was me that sent for Oin and not Thorin. He’d be a million times worse about this,” Dis boldly admitted. And Bella definitely had to concede that she was not wrong.  
  
“Momma, you okay?” Thora asks, poking her head around the leg of a chair.  
  
“I’m okay dears, just tired. Oin’s just here to make sure I don’t have a cold, that’s all. Now, have you shown Kili the new toys Bofur and Bifur brought you?”  
  
That is sufficient to distract the girls long enough for Kili to engage them in play again and let Oin get to work.  
  
“How long h’ve you been feeling tired?”  
  
“For the last few days. I’ve not been sleeping terribly well if I sleep at all.”  
  
“Tossin’ and turnin’? Or is it an inability to go t’sleep and stay asleep?”  
  
“Both. It really depends on the sort of day I’ve had leading up to bedtime.”  
  
“Appetite?” Oin distractedly asks as he takes up Bella’s wrist and watches a pocket watch he’d just removed from his coat pocket.  
  
Bella at this point shows some reluctance in answering, trying to be evasive with “I eat.”  
  
“And d’you eat those seven meals a day hobits are famous for eatin’?” Oin inquires, suspicious.  
  
“Sometimes,” and before she could say anything else, Oin interrupted with --  
  
“Ach, woman, you need to eat. It goes without saying, or at least I thought it did. But you need to eat. Hobbit physiology may be different from dwarrow physiology, but I’m also not entirely unaware of a hobbit’s dietary needs and that includes eating seven meals a day. To put it plainly, Bella, I’m prescribing some bed rest and a strict meal plan of seven meals a day.”  
  
“But… But… Oin, I can’t do that.”  
  
“Oh, yes, you can and you will. You’ve got more than enough people willing to help you out with looking after the girls and cooking meals. So, you just stay in bed, wear your housecoat in front of the fire or sit in the garden, I don’t care. You’re not to do anything remotely strenuous until I say so. And stop looking at me as if I’ve gone off my nut, while you’re at it.”  
  
“Oin, this is mad --”  
  
“No, what’s mad is when I’ve got a patient arguin’ with me. Don’t worry, I’ll stop by the kitchens on the way back and tell Bombur to send something up for luncheon.”  
  
“I can be back in time to make dinner,” Dis offered up.  
  
“Good. And you do not let Bella help with the cooking.”  
  
“I can’t even peel or cut vegetables?” Bella exclaimed with annoyance.  
  
“Bed rest is bed rest,” Is Oin’s final, firm word on the matter before he takes his leave.  
  
“Oh, this is _vexing_,” Bella complains as she drops heavily onto the couch.  
  
“Well, we wouldn’t want you to run yourself into the ground either, Bella,” Dis responded.  
  
“Mummy, why do you look so grumpy?” Eglantine asked, crawling over to prop up her chin on Bella’s arm.  
  
“Mum’s been put on bed rest, sweetie, just for a few days and she isn’t taking it very well at present,” Bella informed them both (since Thora was definitely also curious as to Oin’s early morning visit) with some resignation.  
  
“You act like we’ll be leaving you all alone up here all day,” Kili pouted.  
  
“You all have jobs that keep you busy, so it is reasonable to suppose that I and the girls will be alone at least some of the time for the next few days. And since Oin is very firmly not budging, I suppose I’ll just have to figure out how to make the most of it.”  
  
“That’s the spirit, auntie!”  
  
“Dis, Oin did say nothing strenuous, so please, throw a pillow at your son for me, would you?”  
  
~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~  
  
Seven days into bed rest and Bella was ready to mutiny on principle. Her daughter’s got out more than she did lately, for Yavanna’s sake. The only thing she was allowed to do was walk, and even that had started to look dicey when Thorin had been informed of Bella being put on bed rest. In the midst of Thorin trying to be Very Insistent that Oin clearly meant she shouldn’t walk on her own and Bella insisting she could indeed and would walk, Dis had handed Bella a heavy, thick old tome that Tolur had sent up from the library and told Bella that she would not tell Oin if the book mysteriously took flight in the next few seconds.  
  
Thorin, clearly remembering the library in Bag End, had wisely backed up and backed off, also admitting that he could possibly be over-reacting a little bit.  
  
When the Company had found out at dinner that Bella was on bed rest and restricted to the Royal Wing for a little while, they had promised not to let her be bored to death. And they had been as good as their word. Someone or several someones stopped by at various times of the day. There had been one very pleasant afternoon where Tonil and Tonilia had come for a visit and the girls had had enormous fun playing with Tonilia (or being pawed at by a curious Tonilia) on the rug in front of the fireplace while their mothers looked on and then got into a very spirited discussion about baking that somehow rolled into an equally spirited debate about knitting that only stopped when some obnoxious fake coughing caught their attention from the doorway.  
  
“H-How long have you been standing there?” Tonilia asked the small tangle of dwarrow clumped up by the door. Said clump containing her brother-in-law, Balin, Ori, Kili, and Fili.  
  
“Long enough to wonder how on Arda you went from baking to knitting the way you did. My mind couldn’t comprehend those mental gymnastics -- and I was here for it,” Fili responded as they moved into the room.  
  
“And how the conversation got even more enthusiastic, don’t forget that, brother,” Kili chimed in as he hopped over the couch in a smooth motion.  
  
“Did you know knitting needles double as implements of murder?” Ori chimed in. And when utter silence reigned in the moments after this proclamation, he looked up from the small stack of books he’d been fussing with to say “What?” with perfect innocence.  
  
“Sometimes I think it’s not Nori or Dori we should keep an eye on,” Bofur slowly said, eyeing Ori with eyes of suspicion (that lasted for maybe five seconds before he cracked and smiled).  
  
“Oh, pish,” Ori waved dismissively at his friend.  
  
Bella was very grateful for her friends stopping by, she knew they were very busy with their jobs and duties in the mountain but still took time out to come and see her or take the girls out and show them the mountain. But she was still very quickly being bored out of her skull by being confined to the Royal Quarters.  
  
And on morning ten of her confinement, an unlikely distraction appeared in the kitchen as Bella, Fili (a far more competent cook than his brother), and the girls were finishing up breakfast.  
  
“Ah, Balin, what brings you here so early in the day?” Bella asked, rising from the table to greet the elder dwarf.  
  
“Lessons,” Balin answered as he set a large box down on the table and started pulling smaller boxes and bags out of it.  
  
“Oh, for learning Khuzdul?” Bella asked, her eyes lighting up with scholarly interest.  
  
“Indeed. I thought we could test the waters today, see what works for you and the girls and what does not work. And after that is established, we could set up a timetable and schedule for lessons.”  
  
“Lessons?” Eglantine asked, sharing a not very pleased glance with her sister.  
  
“What for?” Thora asked.  
  
“There’s more to Khuzdul than the curses, little one,” Balin informed her with a smile  
  
“Sounds sensible. Girls, please go put your breakfast things in the sink and then come sit with me.”  
  
Both girls, with a little bit of mutinous grumbling, acquiesce to their mother’s request. Bella has them sit on either side of her while Fili helps Balin set up some of the things he’s brought along with him.  
  
“Now, it’s been a few decades since I’ve had to teach younglings the fundamentals of our language, so it took some time to gather up the necessary tools and supplies to help you learn. And I thought we might start off with something simple, to ease Thora and Eglantine into things,” Balin explains, adopting a posture and tone more akin to a lecturer than a statesman.  
  
Balin picks up a simple wood box near his right hand and begins to remove some simply carved stones, placing them in a row on the table facing the girls and Bella.  
  
“Now, could either of you two tell me what this color is in Common?” Balin asked, pointing to the first shape.  
  
“Blue!” Thora jumped in before Eglantine could open her mouth.  
  
“Correct,” Balin said with a small smile. “And in Khuzdul that word is ‘khagal’.” He spoke the word slowly, enunciated clearly and with a little of his natural accent as he could manage.  
  
“Kha-gal,” Thora and Eglantine both repeat the word (at different times) slowly, as though feeling out the word with their tongues, getting used to it and all.  
  
“Very good. That was not at all bad for a first try. Now, Eglantine, can you tell me what color this stone is?”  
  
“It’s red,” Eglantine promptly answered.  
  
“Correct. In khuzdul, the word I’m about to say translates more directly as ‘crimson’ but since that is but another name for red, it matters little. Repeat after me: damâmbaraz.”  
  
Both girls look at Balin with an incredulous eyebrow raised. “Would you like a hanky to blow your nose?” Thora politely inquires. And that has all the adults present cracking up. Bella even thinks she can hear a guard or two snorting in amusement out in the corridor.  
  
“No thank you, I am perfectly fine, young miss,” is Balin’s response to Thora’s inquiry. He’s trying to come off looking like a severe teacher not amused by his pupil’s sass, but Bella can see the way his eyes are crinkling at the corners that he found it just as amusing as the rest of them had. “Now, let us try this once more: damâmbaraz.”  
  
It takes several tries before Thora and Eglantine both get a passable rendition of the Khuzdul word for ‘red’ out of their mouths, but they do try most admirably. It does help that the words for yellow, purple, green, and orange (tahaf, zabal, danakh, and khatad respectively) require less linguistic gymnastics to pronounce. Balin runs through all the colors again twice more before he moves onto the shapes carved into the surface of the stones.  
  
“And these sticks, well, you can use them to help you while learning the names of various shapes in Khuzdul. Also, and I did not tell you this, girls, excellent for driving a caretaker mad by just grabbing handfuls and tossing them willy-nilly,” Balin added in a dreadful stage whisper that nevertheless had Thora and Eglantine laughing. He was a dab hand with teaching young ones, Bella reflected.  
  
The portion of the lesson that concerned shapes Balin even turned into a game. He handed over several stone carved shapes, to let Thora and Eglantine play with them and familiarize themselves with the shapes. As the girls quite happily and readily did that, Balin set up an equal number of pieces of paper on the table. Each one had the name of the shape in both Common and Khuzdul wrote upon it. As Balin explained it, he would say part of the word and the girls had to put a shape, just the one, down on a piece of paper. Square was ibal, circle was imgam, diamond was idzab, rectangle was ibal abkhub, triangle was ifkham, and star was thatr. The girls listened well when Balin said the word parts and by the third run-through, they were matching stone piece to paper correctly every time.  
  
And after running through shapes and colors, Balin gets out a slate and chalk and starts to draw out the Khuzdul alphabet so each girl (and Bella, honestly) can see what the letters look like, not just how they sound. The lesson goes on for a little while, wrapping up when Balin shows the girls a few games they can play to help them study between lessons (“And that way it won’t feel like such a struggle,” Fili added with a ‘sneaky’ wink behind Balin’s back).  
  
“I think we’ll wrap it up there for today, you did very well Thora and Eglantine,” Balin says when the lesson concludes for the day.  
  
“Thank you, Mister Balin,” the girls’ chorus in that way that will never not be slightly creepy to Fili (no matter how nicely and not creepily said the something happens to be).  
  
“I must say that I am rather surprised by how well-behaved both Thora and Eglantine were during their lessons. Hardly a fidgeting muscle amongst them until near the end!” Balin exclaimed as he and Fili moved a small table out into the garden for elevenses.  
  
“I take it your previous pupils were not so… studious?” Bella asked with the ghost of a mischievous smile playing around her mouth.  
  
“Dwarrow children and, by extension, all dwarrow, are not exactly a ‘sit down and study’ kind of people. A lot of us prefer to just… do,” Fili says as he and Balin with the girls' aid set up the table and Bella sits on a bench and ‘supervises.’  
  
“It can and does make them rather poor students at times,” Balin adds. “Biscuit, Bella? The guard tells me that these are a specialty of Bombur’s.”  
  
“I would love to try one,” Bella said, reaching forward to claim a delicious, golden looking cookie from the plate proffered to her. “Mmm, there is some delicious and high quality butter in this cookie. And some cinnamon and,” Bella takes another bite and thoughtfully, slowly chews it, “And I do believe a dash of nutmeg as well.”  
  
“It all tastes like dessert to me,” Thora says.  
  
“Thora, you weren’t supposed to be eating sweets until after the meal,” Bella chides her eldest.  
  
“I got one for Eggs!” Thora vehemently protests, gesturing to her sister, who does indeed have evidence all over her pinafore of just having consumed a cookie.  
  
Bella rolls her eyes to the heavens as Fili out and out guffaws.  
  
“That is not helping, Fili,” Bella says, trying to be reproachful. He, however, is utterly unrepentant.  
  
“I know it’s not, but damn if that wasn’t hilarious!”  
  
“Balin? If you wouldn’t mind?” Bella turns to the older dwarf and implores.  
  
“Certainly,” Balin readily agrees, walking over to Fili and not-so-gently cuffing him upside the head.  
  
“Ow!”  
  
“That’ll teach you to behave with a bit more restraint, won’t it?” Balin says with a smile that is just so… so very much like Dwalin. “Now, come sit at the table like a proper dwarf and let us eat.”  
  
Elevenses is a fairly quiet affair (with a dwarf like Fili and two young ones there was no way it was going to be an entirely quiet affair) and the talk is nice. Bella enjoys the company and the conversation. Fili is really a very much more astute and canny person than the usual persona he uses in public.  
  
And when Balin prepares to take his leave after elevenses to attend to some duties that cannot be put off, he leaves with Bella a book that is about the size of a sheet of parchment paper but about the width of three of her fingers.  
  
“Something a little bit more advanced for you, Bella, since you’ve already shown an aptitude for languages. Some of the pages at the beginning are like what I went over with the girls today, but this also quickly gets into sentence structure and punctuation and grammar. A bit dry, but whoever scribed this book did include some very fine pictures to liven up the dullness of the words within.”  
  
Bella casually glanced over random pages of the book after Balin had left. The art, though the style was dwarven, was indeed very beautiful. And that the colors and lines still looked as crisp and bright as the day the book was completed spoke well of whoever had the guardianship of this text in the intervening years or decades. Becoming more proficient in Khuzdul was indeed something to look forward to, Bella thought.

**Author's Note:**

> This is just the first chapter of I'm not entirely sure (for once) how many. The tags will be expanding, naturally, but it's good to be back in the saddle of writing in the Hobbit fandom, so to speak. Feel free to leave a comment below and lemme know what you think?


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